Chris Kaminski is a new caterer on the Rim
Country dining scene. He came to the area in April and has
shared his 20 years of culinary skills with about 20 different
clients so far.
He will now be sharing those skills with the
300 people expected to attend A Taste of Rim Country March 7
at the Payson Public Library.
Kaminski is also the in-house caterer for
Majestic Mountain Inn, where his wife Rhonda is the new
general manager.
“With Chris and the catering service now
available, we hope to host more events at Majestic,” Rhonda
said.
Kaminski started his culinary training as a
Boy Scout, but adds his grandmothers and mother were all good
cooks. His grandfather was in the industry, working in a
corporate cafeteria, where the family would sometimes go to
help during holidays.
His formal training was at Johnson County
Community College in Kansas City, Kan. From there he worked in
such places as the Plaza III Steakhouse and Fedora’s in Kansas
City, Mo. He also worked at the Warwick Hotel in Denver and he
also works regularly providing the food for Randy Meyer
Racing.
Kaminski has always done some catering on
the side, but only entered the field professionally last April
when he came to the Rim Country.
He is no stranger to cooking competitions
either. He and his wife have participated in numerous barbecue
contests in Kansas City, Mo. and won several.
Kaminski likes doing barbecue, but he also
enjoys making steaks and tacos (tacos are also one of his
favorite foods to eat). His wife says he makes a very good
steak au poivre and povotica bread. The bread is a filled
Croatian rolled style — it takes all day to make eight loaves
because the yeast dough must rise twice.
He said he enjoys doing Cajun food too;
putting together such things as dirty rice, shrimp Creole and
étouffée, gumbo and jambalaya. Some of the most difficult
dishes he has made are tureens and pâtés.
As for the hardest parts of the catering
business: the paperwork is time consuming and putting parties
together. Since his business is so new, he has not developed
any standard menus.
“My recipes are all on computer and so I
just pull together what I think would be good for the
different events,” Kaminski said.
Talking about success in the kitchen, he
said one of the key elements is having good, sharp knives.
“Sharp knives are safer than dull ones,” he
said.
Good cookware is essential, but surprisingly
only a couple of pans are all that you need.
“You need a sauté pan — one that can go in a
500-degree oven and a stockpot.”
If your family is small — just two of you —
a four- to eight-quart stockpot is sufficient. With a bigger
family, a larger stockpot would be needed.
Anyone interested in going into the culinary
field professionally should further their education: either
formally or working under a good chef in the field.
“If he is good, you can learn all you need
from him,” Kaminski said.
He added it is also important for novices in
the field to move around in the culinary job market.
“It’s hard work and long hours and the pay
isn’t the best,” he said.
“At least not until you become a (lead)
chef,” added Rhonda.
Kaminski said he thinks it would be cool to
do a cookbook some day and has a friend he’d like to write
with.
As for the future, he would like to make his
catering business a go and has invested in it. The Kaminskis
live in Heber-Overgaard and their property has a separate
building with a full, commercial kitchen.
They can make all the dishes for a catering
job and transport them at all the proper temperatures within a
four-hour range. The vehicles they use to transport to jobs
are all self-contained. So, it is not necessary to have a
kitchen available when they cater.
They have not decided exactly what they will
share at A Taste of Rim Country, but are considering preparing
two desserts and two appetizers, and may feature something
with duck.
Tickets to the 2009 A Taste of Rim Country
are $30 and are available at the Payson Public Library, which
is open from 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. Tuesday through Friday and from
10 a.m. to 2 p.m. Saturday.
A limited number of tickets will be sold and
half of the cost is tax deductible.
Javelina cookies and very good bread
By
Teresa
McQuerrey
March 3, 2009
Maggie Evans (with Coco) and her husband Steve
will be among the chefs at Taste of Rim Country this Saturday
at the library.
A Taste of Rim Country is just a few days away.
The Library Friends of Payson event is at 5 p.m., Saturday,
March 7 at the Payson Public Library. Tickets are $30 each,
and a limited number will be sold. To find out more, contact
Bessie Tucker, event coordinator at (928) 474-9260.
How do javelina cookies sound?
Not too appetizing.
How about gingerbread cookies shaped like
javelinas and twice the size of regular cookies?
That’s better. And that is what former
president of the Library Friends of Payson Judy Buettner and
five or six volunteers are preparing for the March 7 Taste of
Rim Country event at the Payson library.
Buettner, now president of the Northern Gila
County Historical Society, offered to help with the library
event when the response from area chefs was coming in on the
slow side. Now, A Taste of Rim Country has 11 chefs signed up
for the big event, sponsored by Library Friends of Payson.
The historical society volunteers participating
in the event are all homegrown cooks, Buettner said. They will
be baking the javelina gingerbread cookies in the kitchen at
the Community Presbyterian Church.
Buettner received her training in the kitchen
from her mother, and did most of her cooking while raising her
four children and caring for many foster children over the
years.
“It was a joy to feed my family something they
liked and was healthy for them,” she said.
Their favorite meal was breaded pork chops,
mashed potatoes, a vegetable and a cake. This was the meal she
usually made for birthdays and other special occasions and the
birthday celebrant was allowed to choose the cake that she
made.
She learned to cook from her mother, but is
learning to cook in a different, healthier fashion these days.
“I like to try recipes from A Taste of Home
Healthy Cooking magazine,” she said. Her husband Jim does most
of the cooking now, she said.
Looking back to the days when she was the main
cook for the family, Buettner said the most complicated dish
she made was chicken Kiev from scratch. The hardest part of
cooking for her family was knowing how much to prepare. Her
children would bring home friends, some foster children would
go and others would come. “It (the number of mouths to feed)
was always changing,” she said.
Buettner kept the ball in the air though;
except for the time she made seven, big apple pies.
“I used that stuff to keep the apples from
turning brown and it ruined them. I had to throw out all seven
pies,” she said.
“I’m really happy that the historical society
is able to help the library friends with this,”
“The more we all work together, the better it
is for Payson,” Buettner said.
Very good bread
Expect to enjoy some very good bread at the
Taste of Rim Country spread being put out by Steve and Maggie
Evans of Verde River Rock House Bed and Breakfast.
The couple gained their sea legs in the kitchen
over diverse courses. Maggie has taken a number of cooking
classes and has worked in bartending and catering. Steve
worked in a restaurant in high school and then went into the
Air Force as a cook.
“He says he made eggs every morning for 5,000
of his closest friends,” Maggie said. “So he’s still my egg
man.”
Maggie started cooking at a very young age,
learning from her grandfather, who was an immigrant from
Germany.
“We expect to make a good showing and have a
lot of fun,” Maggie said.
She said the couple will probably bring three
different items for the event: a hot spinach and artichoke dip
with crusty Italian bread, a pesto with olive bread and
long-stemmed strawberries dipped in chocolate.
The Evanses have attended the event in the
past, but not participated before.
“I catered the artist’s reception for my friend
Matalyn Gardner at Artists of the Rim Gallery and someone told
me I should enter the Taste of Rim Country,” Maggie said.
“I’ve always enjoyed attending, and it’s a
worthy cause.”
The couple enjoys making different dishes for
themselves and their guests at their bed and breakfast. Maggie
said her favorite dish is either a beef or chicken Wellington
and Steve’s is barbecue.
“We use a lot of organic and low-fat
ingredients when we cook for our guests and ourselves,” she
said.
She also likes to experiment in what she eats.
“I had a lobster and macaroni dish at the French Laundry
(restaurant) in Napa Valley and have been trying to make it.
It’s pretty good. Steve loves everything, but he really likes
my version of a Taco Bell burger, which is crumbled ground
beef, sour cream, different bell peppers, sautéed onions and
cheese on a fresh baked bun.”
Maggie said some of the most complicated dishes
she has made include a crab- or lobster-stuffed filet, and
when she first started baking with phylo dough.
Cooking with an audience can sometimes be
difficult, she said. “They sometimes want to know exactly what
you’re doing and I don’t cook like that, or they are so
entertaining I lose track of what I’m doing.”
Her advice to someone interested in a culinary
career is to enjoy what you’re doing.
“The more you enjoy something, the better it
turns out.”
Cindy Fitch,
owner of Creekside Steakhouse, will participate in
the Taste of Rim Country chefs competition
Saturday at the Payson Public Library.
Christopher Creek and Kohl’s Ranch
will make a good showing at the March 7 A Taste of
Rim Country. Both Kohl’s Ranch Zane Grey Steakhouse
and Creekside Steakhouse & Tavern will have
representatives at the 5 p.m. event at the Payson
Public Library.
Cindy Fitch, owner of Creekside
Steakhouse, and Kevin DeWitt, executive chef at
Kohl’s Ranch Zane Grey Steakhouse, are both
participating.
Fitch bought Creekside in
September. “I’m one of Olive’s girls. I worked for
John and Olive (Matus, founders of Creekside) for
eight years.”
She grew up in the culinary
business. Her family did the concessions for both
the Oakland A’s and Chicago Cubs for years, and she
has worked in the fast-food industry for many years.
As owner of Creekside, she does just about
everything, she said.
The most popular dishes she
prepares for guests at the restaurant are steaks and
ribs, shrimp, cobblers and salads with her own
special dressing. However, her favorite thing to eat
is Mexican food. Her family’s favorite dish is her
spaghetti sauce, which she makes with meat and
fennel.
She rarely puts anything
complicated together for her guests — her motto is
“keep it simple” — it is also the trade secret she
is willing to share.
Even keeping things simple can
sometimes create crises though.
“I was cooking for about 180 kids
and made a pot roast. I made brown gravy to go with
it, but there was not enough, so I grabbed what I
thought was a can of more brown gravy and dumped it
into the pot. Toward the bottom of it I discovered
I’d put a can of beans in it instead.”
Another time, she was making
french fries and accidentally added paprika to them.
But it was a happy accident; customers were sending
compliments back about the potatoes.
Fitch said the hardest part of her
job is leaving at night. “I don’t want to leave. I
love it so much.”
For those considering pursuing a
professional career in cooking, Fitch advises
starting at the bottom, bussing tables or doing
dishes. “Don’t leave until everyone is ready to go,”
she said.
Fitch said she might do a cookbook
with family recipes in the future, but for now she
is focused on her restaurant.
“I’d like Creekside to come back
and be able to give back to the community. I hope
people will give us a try again,” she said.
Her plans for A Taste of Rim
Country include ribs and cobbler, and possibly small
salads.
Start young and work hard.
Kevin DeWitt, executive chef at
Kohl’s Ranch Zane Grey Steakhouse, will participate
in the Taste of Rim Country chefs competition
Saturday at the Payson Public Library
Kevin DeWitt is not yet 30, but he
is well-known around the Rim Country for his skills
as a chef.
He began learning about cooking
when he was just 4, standing on a stool and watching
his aunt or grandmother cook.
“I think I made my first meal when
I was 8. My daughter does the same thing, stands on
a stool and watches while my wife cooks.”
His aunt was big in the New
Orleans culinary industry and his grandmother was
always baking from scratch.
DeWitt has been at Kohl’s Ranch
Zane Grey Steakhouse for a little more than two
years. He has also worked at Fargo’s Steakhouse and
at the restaurants at both Chaparral Pines and The
Rim Club. He has participated in A Taste of Rim
Country for about three years, he said.
With his love of cooking, he
started learning the business by attending the East
Valley Institute of Technology’s culinary program in
high school and then went on to earn an associate’s
degree from the Art Institute of Phoenix.
DeWitt enjoys cooking so much he
cannot name his favorite dish to prepare, but his
favorite thing to eat is gumbo. His family’s
favorites are his bread pudding and a dish called
“Chicken Saltimbocca” — a chicken breast wrapped in
thinly sliced prosciutto ham seared to golden brown,
with mushrooms and tomato, sambuca, cream and
Parmesan cheese, served with pasta.
He said the most complicated dish
he has prepared was a layered appetizer that
included fried eggplant disks, quail stuffing,
roasted ratoutille and ferinata, which is chickpea
flour fried in olive oil. “Each component took an
hour to make,” DeWitt said.
His biggest disaster in the
kitchen is not too uncommon — he dropped a souffle.
As for the hardest part of his job: it’s keeping
everyone organized. At Kohl’s, depending on the
season, he has four to six cooks, seven servers and
two to three dishwashers.
Asked about cooking tips, DeWitt
said with so many cooking shows on now, there are
not many things people don’t know. However, he said
cooks need to build flavors slowly, combining
ingredients and then tempering them with a small
amount of salt to enhance the flavor. He added it is
also important to remember to let meats rest after
cooking. “It gives the fibers a chance to relax.”
There are no trade secrets or
magic involved in being a successful professional
chef.
“It’s hard work and it takes a
long time. Going to a culinary school isn’t the
magic answer.”
DeWitt said someone interested in
becoming a professional chef should start training
as young as possible, working with a good chef and
learning as much as possible from them, and then
going to school.
“Keep seeking out good chefs to
learn from,” he said.
DeWitt said he probably will not
be writing a cookbook, but at some point he does
hope to have his own restaurant.
“But I’m fairly happy here,” he
said.
DeWitt said he would probably
bring a blue cheese souffle appetizer and possibly
Crème Brulé to the Taste of Rim Country event. But
he might also bring some of his special Kohl’s Ranch
jerky. If he does, grab a piece and hold on because
it has a kick.
Chef
Kevin Dewitt of the Kohl’s Ranch Zane Grey Dining Room took home the
People’s Choice Award at the 2009 Taste of Rim Chef’s Extravaganza
with his delicious marinated flank steak strips appetizer and orange
custard dessert. Eleven other area chefs presented a sampling of their
menus, making the choice of favorite very difficult for the hundreds of
guests who enjoyed the evening. 
prep
work for their dish.
